UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA 
AT  LOS  ANGELES 


llmbcratij 


tm 

MRS.  WILLARD  HALL  PORTER 

AND 

"ILLARD  HALL  PORTER,  JR.. 


ADDRESS 


IN   COMMEMORATION   OF 


INAUGURATION 


OF 


FIRST  PRESIDENT  OF  THE  UNITED  STATES 

DELIVERED   BEFORE  THE 

TWO  HOUSES  OF  CONGRESS 

DECEMBER  n,  1889 


BY 


MELVILLE    WESTON    FULLER,    LL.D. 
Chief-Justice  of  the  United  States 


WASHINGTON 

GOVERNMENT     PRINTING     OFFICE 
1890 


a- 


PREFACE, 


By  the  sundry  civil  appropriation  bill  of  March  2,  1889,  it  was 
enacted  as  follows: 

"  SEC.  4.  That  in  order  that  the  centennial  anniversary  of  the  inauguration  of 
the  first  President  of  the  United  States,  George  Washington,  may  be  duly  com- 
memorated, Tuesday,  the  thirtieth  day  of  April,  anno  Domini  eighteen  hundred 
and  eighty-nine,  is  hereby  declared  to  be  a  national  holiday  throughout  the  United 
States.     And  in  further  commemoration  of  this  historic  event,  the  two  houses  of 
Congress  shall  assemble  in  the  Hall  of  the  House  of  Representatives  on  the  second 
Wednesday  of  December,  anno  Domini  eighteen  hundred  and  eighty-nine,  when 
suitable  ceremonies  shall  be  had  under  the  direction  of  a  joint  committee  composed 
of  five  Senators  and  five  Representatives,  members  of  the  Fifty-first  Congress,  who 
shall  be  appointed  by  the  presiding  officers  of  the  respective  houses.     And  said 
I  I          joint  committee  shall  have  power  to  sit  during  the  recess  of  Congress ;  and  it  shall 
v  \          be  its  duty  to  make  arrangements  for  the  celebration  in  the  Hall  of  the  House  of 
.    N  Representatives  on  the  second  Wednesday  of  December  next,  and  may  invite  to 

be  present  thereat  such  officers  of  the  United  States  and  of  the  respective  States 
of  the  Union,  and  (through  the  Secretary  of  State)  representatives  of  foreign  Gov- 

£  ernments..     The  committee  shall  invite  the  Chief- Justice  of  the  United  States  to 

n  V  .  J 

deliver  a  suitable  address  on  the  occasion.     And  for  the  purpose  of  defraying  the 

expenses  of  said  joint  committee  and  of  carrying  out  the  arrangements  which  it 
may  make,  three  thousand  dollars,  or  so  much  thereof  as  may  be  necessary."     25 
V^         Stat.,  980,  c.  411,  g  4. 

This  joint  committee,  as  organized,  consisted  of  Mr.  HISCOCK  of 
^j  New  York,  Mr.  SHERMAN  of  Ohio,  Mr.  HOAR  of  Massachusetts,  Mr. 
VOORHEES  of  Indiana,  and  Mr.  EUSTIS  of  Louisiana,  on  the  part  of 
the  Senate;  and  of  Mr.  BAYNEO£  Pennsylvania,  Mr.  HITT  of  Illinois, 
Mr.  CARTER  of  Montana,  Mr.  CULBERSON  of  Texas,  and  Mr.  CUM- 
MINGS  of  New  York,  on  the  part  of  the  House  of  Representatives. 

It  agreed  upon  and  issued  the  following  as  the  order  of  arrange- 
ments at  the  Capitol: 

The  Capitol  will  be  closed  on  the  morning  of  the  i  ith  to  all  except  the  members 
and  officers  of  Congress.  Invited  guests  will  be  admitted  by  tickets. 

At  1 1  o'clock  the  east  door  leading  to  the  Rotunda  will  be  opened  to  those  hold- 
ing tickets  of  admission  to  the  floor  of  the  House  and  its  galleries. 


WITHDRAWN 


4  Preface. 

The  floor  of  the  House  of  Representatives  will  be  opened  for  the  admission  of 
Senators  and  Representatives,  and  to  those  having  tickets  of  admission  thereto, 
who  will  be  conducted  to  the  seats  assigned  to  them. 

The  President  and  ex-Presidents  of  the  United  States  will  be  seated  in  front 
and  on  the  right  of  the  Presiding  Officer. 

The  Justices  of  the  Supreme  Court  will  occupy  seats  next  to  the  President,  in 
front  and  on  the  right  of  the  Presiding  Officer. 

The  Cabinet  Officers,  the  Hon.  George  Bancroft,  the  General  of  the  Army  (re- 
tired), the  Admiral  of  the  Navy,  the  Major-General  commanding  the  Army,  and 
the  officers  of  the  Army  and  Navy  who,  by  name,  have  received  the  thanks  of 
Congress,  will  occupy  seats  directly  in  rear  of  the  President  and  Supreme  Court. 

The  Chief- Justice  and  Judges  of  the  Court  of  Claims  and  the  Chief-Justice  and 
Associate  Justices  of  the  Supreme  Court  of  the  District  of  Columbia  will  occupy 
seats  directly  in  rear  of  the  Cabinet. 

The  Diplomatic  Corps  will  occupy  seats  in  front  and  on  the  left  of  the  Presiding 
Officer. 

International  American  Congress  and  Marine  Conference  will  occupy  seats  in 
rear  of  the  Diplomatic  Corps.  Cards  of  admission  will  be  delivered  to  the  Secre- 
tary of  State. 

Ex-Vice-Presidents  and  Senators  will  occupy  seats  in  rear  of  the  Judiciary. 

Representatives  will  occupy  seats  behind  the  Senators  and  representatives  of 
foreign  Governments. 

Commissioners  of  the  District,  Governors  of  States  and  Territories,  and  guests 
invited  to  the  floor,  will  occupy  seats  behind  the  Representatives. 

The  Executive  Gallery  will  be  reserved  exclusively  for  the  families  of  the  Su- 
preme Court,  the  families  of  the  Cabinet,  and  the  invited  guests  of  the  President. 

The  Diplomatic  Galler>-  will  be  reserved  exclusively  for  the  families  of  the 
members  of  the  Diplomatic  Corps.  Cards  of  admission  will  be  delivered  to  the 
Secretary  of  State. 

The  Reporters'  Gallery  will  be  reserved  exclusively  for  the  use  of  the  reporters 
of  the  press.  Tickets  thereto  will  be  delivered  to  the  Press  Committee. 

The  Official  Reporters  of  the  Senate  and  of  the  House  will  occupy  the  Reporters' 
desk,  in  front  of  the  Clerk's  table. 

The  Marine  Band  will  occupy  the  south  corridor  in  rear  of  the  Presiding  Officer. 

The  Diplomatic  Corps,  International  American  Congress,  and  Marine  Confer- 
ence and  other  foreign  guests  will  assemble  in  the  Marble  Room  of  the  Senate; 
the  Judiciary  at  the  Supreme  Court  Room;  the  President,  ex- Presidents,  the  Cab- 
inet, and  the  ex- Vice -Presidents  will  meet  at  the  President's  Room  at  12.30  p.  m. 

The  House  being  in  session,  and  notification  to  that  effect  having  been  given  to 
the  Senate,  the  Vice- President  and  the  Senate  in  a  body,  preceded  by  the  Presi- 
dent, ex-Presidents,  ex-Vice-Presidents,  the  Cabinet,  the  Judiciary,  the  Diplomatic 
Corps,  International  American  Congress,  and  Marine  Conference  will  proceed  to 
the  Hall  of  the  House  of  Representatives. 

The  Vice-President  will  occupy  the  Speaker's  chair,  and  will  preside. 

The  Speaker  of  the  House  will  occupy  a  seat  at  the  left  of  the  Vice-President. 


Preface.  5 

The  other  officers  of  the  Senate  and  of  the  House  will  occupy  seats  on  the  floor 
at  the  right  and  the  left  of  the  Presiding  Officer. 

The  Architect  of  the  Capitol,  the  Sergeant-at-Arms  of  the  Senate,  the  Sergeant- 
at-Arms  and  the  Doorkeeper  of  the  House  are  charged  with  the  execution  of 
these  arrangements. 

Accordingly,  on  the  nth  of  December,  at  i  o'clock  p.  m.,  the 
President  of  the  United  States,  with  the  members  of  his  Cabinet  and 
the  Chief-Justice  and  Associate  Justices  of  the  Supreme  Court,  entered 
the  Hall  of  the  House  of  Representatives  and  occupied  the  seats 
reserved  for  them  in  front  and_  on  the  right  of  the  Presiding  Officer. 

Next  the  members  of  the  Senate,  following  the  Vice-President  and 
and  their  Secretary,  preceded  by  their  Sergeant-at-Arms,  entered  the 
Hall  and  took  the  seats  reserved  for  them  on  the  right  and  left  of  the 
main  aisle. 

The  Vice-President  occupied  the  Speaker's  chair,  the  Speaker  of 
the  House  sitting  at  his  left. 

The  Major- General  commanding  the  Army,  the  Diplomatic  Corps, 
the  International  American  Congress,  and  Marine  Conference,  and 
the  other  persons  designated  in  the  order  of  exercises,  were  seated  in 
accordance  with  the  arrangements  of  the  joint  committee. 

The  Vice-President  announced  the  object  of  the  meeting,  and,  after 
prayer  by  the  Chaplain  of  the  Senate,  said  "an  oration  will  now  be 
delivered  by  Melville  W.  Fuller,  Chief-Justice  of  the  United  States." 

At  the  close  of  the  address  a  benediction  was  said  by  the  Chaplain 
of  the  House  of  Representatives,  Tne  President  of  the  United  States, 
with  the  members  of  his  Cabinet,  the  Supreme  Court,  the  Senate,  and 
the  invited  guests  then  retired  from  the  Hall,  while  the  Marine  Band 
played  "  Washington's  Grand  March*. " 


Mr.  President,  Mr.  Speaker,  and  gentlemen  of  the  Senate 
and  House  of  Representatives :  By  the  terms  of  that  section 
of  the  act  of  Congress  under  which  we  have  assembled  in 
further  commemoration  of  the  historic  event  of  the  inaugu- 
ration of  the  first  President  of  the  United  States,  George 
Washington,  the  3Oth  of  April,  A.  D.  1889,  was  declared  a 
national  holiday,  and  in  the  noble  city  where  that  event 
took  place  its  centennial  anniversary  has  been  celebrated 
with  a  magnificence  of  speech  and  song,  of  multitudinous 
assembly,  and  of  naval,  military,  and  civic  display,  accom- 
panied by  every  manifestation  of  deep  love  of  country,  of 
profound  devotion  to  its  institutions,  and  of  intense  appre- 
ciation of  the  virtues  and  services  of  that  illustrious  man 
whose  assumption  of  the  Chief  Magistracy  gave  the  assur- 
ance of  the  successful  setting  in  motion  of  the  new  Govern- 
ment. 

Nothing  on  the  occasion  of  that  celebration  could  be  more 
full  of  encouragement  and  hope  than  the  testimony  so  over- 
whelmingly given  that  Washington  still  remained  first  in 
the  hearts  of  his  countrymen,  and  that  the  example  afforded 
by  his  career  was  still  cherished  as  furnishing  that  guide  of 
public  conduct  which  had  kept  and  would  keep  the  nation 
upon  the  path  of  glory  for  itself  and  of  happiness  for  its 
people. 

The  majestic  story  of  that  life — whether  told  in  the  pages 
of  Marshall  or  Sparks,  of  Irving  or  Bancroft,  or  through 
the  eloquent  utterances  of  Ames  or  Webster,  or  Everett  or 
Winthrop,  or  the  matchless  poetry  of  Lowell,  or  the  verse  of 
Byron — never  grows  old. 


8  Address  of  Chief  Justice  Fuller. 

We  love  to  hear  again  what  the  great  Frederick  and  Na- 
poleon, what  Erskine  and  Fox  and  Brougham  and  Talley- 
rand and  Fontanes  and  Guizot  said  of  him,  and  how  crape 
enshrouded  the  standards  of  France,  and  the  flags  upon  the 
victorious  ships  of  England  fell  fluttering  to  half-mast  at  the 
tidings  of  his  death. 

The  passage  of  the  century  has  not  in  the  slightest  degree 
impaired  the  irresistible  charm  ;  and  whatever  doubts  or 
fears  assail  us  in  the  turmoil  of  our  impetuous  national  life, 
that  story  comes  to  console  and  to  strengthen,  like  the 
shadow  of  a  great  rock  in  a  weary  land. 

Washington  had  become  first  in  war,  not  so  much  by 
reason  of  victories  over  the  enemy,  though  he  had  won  such, 
or  of  success  in  strategy,  though  that  had  been  his,  as  of 
the  triumphs  of  a  constancy  which  no  reverse,  no  hardship, 
no  incompetency,  no  treachery  could  shake  or  overcome. 

And  because  the  people  comprehended  the  greatness  of 
their  leader  and  recognized  in  him  an  entire  absence  of  per- 
sonal ambition,  an  absolute  obedience  to  convictions  of 
duty,  an  unaffected  love  of  country,  of  themselves,  and  of 
mankind,  he  had  become  first  in  the  hearts  of  his  country- 
men. 

Because  thus  first,  he  was  to  become  first  in  peace,  by 
bringing  to  the  charge  of  the  practical  working  of  the  sys- 
tem he  had  participated  in  creating,  on  behalf  of  the  people 
whose  independence  he  had  achieved,  the  same  serene  judg- 
ment, the  same  sagacity,  the  same  patience,  the  same  sense 
of  duty,  the  same  far-sighted  comprehension  of  the  end  to  be 
attained  that  had  marked  his  career  from  its  beginning. 

From  the  time  he  assumed  command  he  had  given  up  all 
idea  of  accommodation,  and  believed  that  there  was  no  mid- 
dle ground  between  subjugation  and  complete  independence, 
and  that  independence  the  independence  of  a  nation. 

He  had  demanded  national  action  in  respect  of  the  Army; 
he  had  urged,  but  a  few  weeks  after  Bunker  Hill,  the  crea- 
tion of  a  Federal  court  with  jurisdiction  co-extensive  with 


Address  of  Chief  Justice  Fuller.  9 

the  colonies ;  he  had  during  the  war  repeatedly  pressed  home 
his  deep  conviction  of  the  indispensability  of  a  strong  cen- 
tral government,  and  particularly  at  its  close,  in  his  circu- 
lar to  the  governors  of  the  States  and  his  farewell  to  his 
comrades.  He  had  advocated  the  promotion  of  commercial 
intercourse  with  the  rising  world  of  the  West,  so  that  its 
people  might  be  bound  to  those  of  the  sea-board  by  a  chain 
that  could  never  be  broken.  Appreciating  the  vital  impor- 
tance of  territorial  influences  to  the  political  life  of  a  com- 
monwealth, he  had  approved  the  cessions  by  the  landed 
States,  none  more  significant  than  that  by  his  own,  and  had 
made  the  profound  suggestion — which  was  acted  on — of  a 
line  of  conduct  proper  to  be  observed  for  the  government  of 
the  citizens  of  America  in  their  settlement  of  the  Western 
country,  which  involved  the  assertion  of  the  sovereign  right 
of  eminent  domain.  He  had  advised  the  commissioners  of 
Virginia  and  Maryland,  in  consultation  at  Mount  Vernon  in 
relation  to  the  navigation  of  the  Potomac,  to  recommend  a 
uniform  currency  and  a  uniform  system  of  commercial  reg- 
ulations, and  this  led  to  the  calling  of  the  conference  of 
commissioners  of  the  thirteen  States.  At  the  proper  mo- 
ment he  had  thrown  his  immense  personal  influence  in  favor 
of  the  convention  and  secured  the  ratification  of  the  Consti- 
tution. 

It  remained  for  him  to  crown  his  labors  by  demonstrating 
in  their  administration  the  value  of  the  institutions  whose 
establishment  had  been  so  long  the  object  of  his  desire. 

"It  is  already  beyond  doubt,"  wrote  Count  Moustier,  in 
June,  1789,  "that  in  spite  of  the  asserted  beauty  of  the  plan 
which  has  been  adopted,  it  would  have  been  necessary  to 
renounce  its  introduction  if  the  same  man  who  presided  over 
its  formation  had  not  been  placed  at  the  head  of  the  enter- 
prise. The  extreme  confidence  in  his  patriotism,  his  integ- 
rity, and  his  intelligence  forms  to-day  its  principal  support. ' ' 

There  were  obvious  difficulties  surrounding  the  first  Pres- 
ident. Eleven  States  had  ratified,  but  the  assent  of  some 


I0  Address  of  Chief  Justice  Fuller. 

had  been  secured  only  after  strenuous  exertion,  considerable 
delay,  and  upon  close  votes. 

So  slowly  did  the  new  Government  get  under  way  that 
the  first  Wednesday  of  March,  the  day  designated  for  the 
Senate  and  House  to  assemble,  came  and  went,  and  it  was 
not  until  the  ist  of  April  that  the  House  obtained  a  quorum, 
and  not  until  the  6th  that  the  electoral  vote  was  counted  in 
joint  convention. 

An  opposition  so  intense  and  bitter  as  that  which  had  ex- 
isted to  the  adoption  of  the  Constitution  could  not  readily 
die  out,  and  the  antagonisms  which  lay  at  its  base  were  as 
old  as  human  nature. 

Jealousies  existed  between  the  smaller  and  the  larger,  be- 
tween the  agricultural  and  the  commercial,  States,  and  these 
were  rendered  the  keener  by  the  rivalries  of  personal  ambi- 
tion. 

Those  who  admired  the  theories  of  the  French  philosoph- 
ical school  and  those  who  preferred  the  British  model  could 
not  readily  harmonize  their  differences,  while  the  enthusi- 
astic believers  in  the  capacity  of  man  for  self-government 
denounced  the  more  conservative  for  doubting  the  extent  of 
the  reliance  which  could  be  placed  upon  it. 

The  fear  of  arbitrary  power  took  particular  form  in  ref- 
erence to  the  presidential  office,  which  had  been  fashioned 
in  view  of  the  personal  government  of  George  the  Third, 
rather  than  on  the  type  of  monarchy  of  the  English  system 
as  it  was  in  principle,  and  as  it  is  in  fact. 

And  this  fear  was  indulged  notwithstanding  the  frequency 
of  elections,  since  no  restriction  as  to  re-eligibility  was  im- 
posed upon  the  incumbent. 

But  no  fear,  no  jealousy,  could  be  entertained  of  him  who 
had  indignantly  repelled  the  suggestion  of  the  bestowal  of 
kingly  power;  who  had  unsheathed  the  sword  with  reluc- 
tance and  laid  it  down  with  joy;  who  had  never  sought 
official  position,  but  accepted  public  office  as  a  public  trust, 
in  deference  to  so  unanimous  a  demand  for  his  services  as 


Address  of  Chief  justice  Fuller.  1 1 

to  convince  him  of  their  necessity;  whose  patriotism  em- 
braced the  whole  country,  the  future  grandeur  of  which  his 
prescience  foresaw. 

Nevertheless,  while  there  could  be  no  personal  opposition 
to  the  unanimous  choice  of  the  people,  and  while  his  availa- 
bility at  the  crisis  was  one  of  those  providential  blessings 
which,  in  other  instances,  he  had  so  often  insisted  had  been 
bestowed  upon  the  nation,  the  fact  remained  that  the  situa- 
tion was  full  of  trial  and  danger,  and  demanded  the  appli- 
cation of  the  highest  order  of  statesmanship. 

Nor  are  we  left  to  conjecture  Washington's  feelings  in 
this  regard. 

Indeed,  it  maybe  said  that  at  every  period  of  his  public  life, 
though  he  possessed  the  talent  for  silence  and  did  his  work 
generally  with  closed  lips,  it  is  always  possible  to  gather 
from  his  remarkable  letters  the  line  of  his  thought  upon 
current  affairs,  and  his  inmost  hopes,  fears,  and  aspirations 
as  to  the  public  weal. 

Take  for  illustration  that  in  which,  on  the  Qth  of  January, 
1790,  little  more  than  eight  months  after  his  inauguration, 
he  says: 

The  establishment  of  our  new  Government  seemed  to  be  the  last 
great  experiment  for  promoting  human  happiness  by  a  reasonable 
compact  in  civil  society.  It  was  to  be,  in  the  first  instance,  in  a  con- 
siderable degree  a  government  of  accommodation  as  well  as  a  gov- 
ernment of  laws.  Much  was  to  be  done  by  prudence,  much  by 
conciliation,  much  by  firmness.  Few,  who  are  not  philosophical 
spectators,  can  realize  the  difficult  and  delicate  part  which  a  man  in 
my  situation  had  to  act.  All  see  and  most  admire  the  glare  which 
hovers  round  the  external  happiness  of  elevated  office.  To  me  there 
is  nothing  in  it  beyond  the  luster  which  may  be  reflected  from  its 
connection  with  a  power  of  promoting  human  felicity.  In  our  prog- 
ress towards  political  happiness  my  station  is  new,  and,  if  I  may  use 
the  expression,  I  walk  on  untrodden  ground.  There  is  scarcely  an 
action  the  motive  of  which  may  not  be  subject  to  a  double  interpre- 
tation. There  is  scarcely  any  part  of  my  conduct  which  may  not 
hereafter  be  drawn  into  precedent.  If,  after  all  my  honorable  and 


12  Address  of  Chief  Justice  Fuller. 

faithful  endeavors  to  advance  the  felicity  of  my  country  and  man- 
•kind,  I  may  indulge  a  hope  that  my  labors  havejiot  been  altogether 
without  success,  it  will  be  the  only  compensation  I  can  receive  in  the 
closing  scenes  of  life. 

Here  he  admits  with  a  certain  suppressed  sadness  that  he 
realizes  that  private  life  has  ceased  to  exist  for  him,  and  that 
from  his  previous  participation  in  public  affairs,  the  exalted 
character  of  the  new  office,  and  the  fact  that  he  is  the  first  to 
fill  it,  his  every-  act  and  word  thereafter  may  be  referred  to 
in  guidance  or  control  of  others,  and  as  bearing  upon  the 
nature  of  the  Government  of  which  he  was  the  head.  It  is 
borne  in  upon  him  that  in  this  instance,  in  a  greater  degree 
than  ever  before,  his  conduct  is  to  become  an  historical  ex- 
ample. Questions  of  etiquette,  questions  pertaining  to  his 
daily  life,  unimportant  in  themselves,  cease  to  be  so  under 
the  new  conditions,  and  this  interruption  of  the  domestic 
tenor  of  his  way,  to  which  he  was  of  choice  and  ardently 
attached,  finds  no  compensation  in  the  gratification  of  a 
morbid  hunger  and  thirst  for  applause,  whether  of  the  few 
or  of  the  many. 

But  in  the  consciousness  of  having  contributed  to  the 
advancement  of  the  felicity  of  his  country  and  of  mankind 
lies  the  true  reward  for  these  renewed  labors. 

The  promotion  of  human  happiness  was  the  key-note  of 
the  century  within  which  Washington's  life  was  comprised. 

It  was  the  century  of  Franklin  and  Turgot;  of  Montes- 
quieu and  Voltaire  and  Rosseau ;  of  Frederick  the  Great  and 
Joseph  the  Second;  of  Pitt  and  Fox  and  Burke  and  Grattan; 
of  Burns  and  Cowper  and  Gray;  of  Goethe  and  Kant;  of 
Priestly  and -Hume  and  Adam  Smith ;  of  Wesley  and  White- 
field  and  Howard,  as  well  as  of  the  long  line  of  statesmen 
and  soldiers,  and  voyagers  over  every  sea;  of  poets  and  art- 
ists and  essayists  and  encyclopaedists  and  romancers,  which 
adorned  it 

It  was  the  century  of  men  like  Condorcet,  who,  outlawed 
and  condemned  by  a  revolutionary  tribunal,  the  outcome  of 


Address  of  Chief  Justice  Fuller.  13 

popular  excesses,  calmly  sat  down,  in  hiding,  to  compose 
his  work  upon  the  progress  of  the  human  mind. 

It  was  a  century  instinct  with  the  recognition  of  the  hu- 
man soul  in  every  human  being,  and  alive  with  aspirations 
for  universal  brotherhood. 

With  this  general  longing  for  the  elevation  of  mankind 
Washington  sympathized,  and  in  expressing  a  hearty  desire 
for  the  rooting  out  of  slavery  considered  it  not  only  essen- 
tial to  the  perpetuation  of  the  Union,  but  desirable  on  the 
score  of  human  dignity.  Nevertheless,  with  the  calm  rea- 
son in  reference  to  government  of  the  race  from  which  he 
sprang,  he  regarded  the  promotion  of  human  happiness  as 
to  be  best  secured  by  a  reasonable  compact  in  civil  society, 
and  that  established  by  the  Federal  Constitution  as  the  last 
great  experiment  to  that  end. 

Washington  and  his  colleagues  were  familiar  with  prior 
forms  of  government  and  their  operation,  and  with  the 
speculations  of  the  writers  upon  that  subject.  They  were 
conversant  with  the  course  of  the  Revolution  of  1688,  the 
then  triumph  of  public  opinion,  and  the  literature  of  that 
period.  They  accepted  the  thesis  of  Locke  that,  as  the  true 
end  of  government  is  the  mutual  preservation  of  the  lives, 
liberties,  and  estates  of  the  people,  a  government  which  in- 
vades these  rights  is  guilty  of  a  breach  of  trust,  and  can 
lawfully  be  set  aside  ;  and  they  were  persuaded  of  the  sound- 
ness of  the  views  of  Montesquieu,  that  the  distribution  of 
powers  is  necessary  to  political  liberty,  which  can  only  exist 
when  power  is  not  abused,  and  in  order  that  power  may  not 
be  abused  it  must  be  so  distributed  that  power  shall  check 
power. 

It  is  only  necessary  to  consult  the  pages  of  the  Feder- 
alist— :that  incomparable  work  on  the  principles  of  free 
government — to  understand  the  acquaintance  of  American 
statesmen  with  preceding  governmental  systems,  ancient 
and  modern,  and  to  comprehend  that  the  Constitution  was 
the  result,  not  of  a  desire  for  novelty,  but  of  the  effort  to 


14  Address  of  Chief  justice  Fuller. 

gather  the  fruit  of  that  growth  which,  having  its  roots  in 
the  past,  could  yield  in  the  present  and  give  promise  for  the 
future. 

The  colonists  possessed  practically  a  common  nationality, 
and  took  by  inheritance  certain  fundamental  ideas  upon  the 
development  of  which  their  growth  had  proceeded.  Self- 
government  by  local  subdivisions,  a  legislative  body  of  two 
houses,  an  executive  head,  a  distinctive  judiciary,  consti- 
tuted the  governmental  methods. 

MagnaCharta,  the  Petition  and  Declaration  of  Rights,  the 
habeas  corpus  act,  the  act  of  settlement,  all  the  muniments 
of  English  liberty,  were  theirs,  and  the  New  England  Con- 
federation of  1643,  the  schemes  of  union  of  1754  and  1765, 
the  revolutionary  Congress,  the  Articles  of  Confederation, 
the  colonial  charters  and  constitutions,  furnished  a  vast 
treasury  of  experience  upon  which  they  drew. 

Their  work  in  relation  to  what  had  gone  before  was  in 
truth  but  in  maintenance  of  that  continuity  of  which  Hooker 
speaks  :  "We  were  then  alive  in  our  predecessors  and  they 
in  their  successors  do  live  still."  They  did  not  seek  to 
build  upon  the  ruins  of  older  institutions,  but  to  develop 
from  them  a  nobler,  broader,  and  more  lasting  structure,  and 
in  effecting  this  upon  so  vast  a  scale  and  under  conditions 
so  widely  different  from  the  past,  the  immortal  instrument 
was  indeed  the  product  of  consummate  statesmanship. 

Of  the  future  greatness  of  the  new  nation  Washington  had 
no  doubt.  He  saw,  as  if  face  to  face,  that  continental  do- 
main which  glimmered  to  others  as  through  a  glass  darkly. 

The  great  West  was  no  sealed  book  to  him,  and  no  one 
knew  better  than  he  that  no  foreign  power  could  long  con- 
trol the  flow  of  the  Father  of  Waters  to  the  Gulf. 

He  is  said' to  have  lacked  imagination,  and  if  the  exhila- 
ration of  the  poet,  the  mystic,  or  the  seer  is  meant,  this  may 
be  true. 

His  mind  was  not  given  to  indulgence  in  dreams  of  ideal 
commonwealths  like  the  republic  of  Plato  or  of  Cicero,  the 
City  of  God  of  Augustine,  or  the  Utopia  of  Sir  Thomas 


Address  of  Chief  justice  Fuller.  15 

More,  but  it  grasped  the  mighty  fact  of  the  empire  of  the 
future,  and  acted  in  obedience  to  the  heavenly  vision. 

But  the  question  was,  could  that  empire  be  realized  and 
controlled  by  the  people  within  its  vast  boundaries  in  the 
exercise  of  self-government? 

Could  the  conception  of  a  central  government,  operating 
directly  upon  citizens  who  at  the  same  time  were  subject  to 
the  jurisdiction  of  their  several  States,  be  carried  into  prac- 
tical working  operation  so  as  to  reconcile  imperial  sway 
with  local  independence? 

Would  a  scheme  work  which  was  partly  national  and 
partly  federal,  and  which  aimed  at  unity  as  well  as  union? 

And  could  the  rule  of  the  majority  be  subjected  with 
binding  force  to  such  restraints  through  a  system  by  repre- 
sentation, that  of  a  republic  rather  than  that  of  a  pure  de- 
mocracy, that  the  violence  of  faction  could  not  operate  in 
the  long  run  to  defeat  a  common  government  by  the  many 
throughout  so  immense  an  area? 

Could  the  restraints  essential  to  the  preservation  of  society, 
the  equilibrium  between  progress  and  order,  be  so  guarded 
as  to  allow  of  that  sober  second  thought  which  would  secure 
their  observance,  and  thus  the  liberty  and  happiness  of  the 
people  and  the  enduring  progress  of  humanity? 

While  the  general  genius  of  the  Government  was  thor- 
oughly permeated  with  the  ideas  of  freedom  in  obedience, 
yet  time  was  needed  to  commend  the  form  in  which  it  was 
for  the  future  to  exert  itself. 

Hence  administration  in  the  first  instance  required  accom- 
modation as  well  as  adherence  to  the  letter,  and  prudence 
and  conciliation  as  well  as  firmness. 

The  Cabinet  of  the  first  President  illustrates  his  sense  of 
the  nature  of  the  exigency. 

All  its  members  were  friends  and  supporters  of  the  Con- 
stitution, but  possessed  of  widely  different  views  as  to  the 
scope  of  its  powers  and  the  probabilities  of  its  successful 
operation  in  the  shape  it  then  bore. 


1 6  Address  of  Chief  Justice  Fuller. 

Between  Jefferson  and  Hamilton  there  seemed  to  be  a 
great  gulf  fixed,  yet  a  common  patriotism  bridged  it,  and  a 
common  purpose  enabled  them  for  these  critical  years  to  act 
together.  And  this  was  rendered  possible  by  the  fact  that 
the  leadership  of  Washington  afforded  a  common  ground 
upon  which  every  lover  of  a  united  country  could  stand. 
And  as  the  first  four  years  were  nearing  their  close,  Hamil- 
ton and  Jefferson  severally  "urged  Washington  to  consent  to 
remain  at  the  helm  for  four  years  longer,  that  the  Govern- 
ment might  acquire  additional  firmness  and  strength  before 
being  subjected  to  the  strain  of  the  contention  of  parties. 

Undoubtedly  Hamilton  desired  this  also  because  of  nearer 
coincidence  of  thought  on  some  questions  involving  serious 
difference  of  opinion,  but  both  concurred  in  urging  it  upon 
the  ground  that  the  confidence  of  the  whole  Union  was  cen- 
tered in  Washington,  and  his  being  at  the  helm  would  be 
more  than  an  answer  to'  every  argument  which  could  be 
used  to  alarm  and  lead  the  people  in  any  quarter  into  vio- 
lence or  secession. 

Appointments  to  the  Supreme  Bench  involved  less  reason 
for  accommodation,  but  equal  prudence  and  sagacity. 

The  great  part  which  that  tribunal  was  to  play  in  the 
development  of  our  institutions  was  yet  to  come,  but  the 
importance  of  that  branch  of  the  Government  to  which  was 
committed  the  ultimate  interpretation  of  the  Constitution 
was  appreciated  by  Washington,  who  characterized  it  as  the 
keystone  of  the  political  fabric. 

To  the  headship  of  the  court  Washington  called  the  pure 
and  great-minded  Jay,  of  New  York,  and  associated  with  him 
John  Rutledge,  of  South  Carolina,  who,  from  the  stamp-act 
Congress  of  1765,  had  borne  a  conspicuous  part  in  the  his- 
tory of  the  country  and  of  his  State ;  James  Wilson,  of 
Pennsylvania,  who,  like  Rutledge,  had  been  prominent  in 
the  Continental  Congress  and  in  the  Federal  Convention,  a 
signer  of  the  Declaration  of  Independence,  and  one  of  the 
most  forcible,  acute,  and  learned  debaters  on  behalf  of  the 


Address  of  Chief  Justice  Fuller.  1 7 

Constitution,  as  the  records  of  the  Federal  and  his  State 
conventions  show  ;  Gushing,  chief-justice  of  Massachusetts, 
experienced  in  judicial  station,  and  the  only  person  holding 
office  under  the  Crown  who  adhered  to  his  country  in  the 
Revolution ;  Harrison,  of  Maryland,  Washington's  well- 
known  secretary  ;  Blair,  of  Virginia,  a  judge  of  its  court  of 
appeals,  and  one  of  Washington's  fellow-members  in  the 
convention ;  and  in  place  of  Rutledge  and  Harrison,  who 
preferred  the  highest  judicial  positions  in  their  own  States, 
Thomas  Johnson,  of  Maryland,  and  James  Iredell,  of  North 
Carolina. 

It  will  be  perceived  that  the  distribution  was  made  with 
tact,  and  the  selections  with  consummate  wisdom. 

The  part  the  appointees  had  taken  in  the  cause  of  the 
country,  and  especially  in  laying  the  foundations  of  the 
political  edifice,  their  eminent  qualifications  and  recognized 
integrity,  commended  the  court  to  the  confidence  of  the  peo- 
ple, and  gave  assurance  that  this  great  department  would  be 
so  administered  as  to  effectuate  the  purposes  for  which  it 
had  been  created. 

As  to  appointments  generally,  he  did  not  recognize  the 
rule  of  party  rewards  for  party  work,  although,  when  party 
opposition  became  clearly  defined,  he  wrote  Pickering  that 
to  "bring  a  man  into  any  office  of  consequence,  knowingly, 
whose  political  tenets  are  adverse  to  the  measures  which  the 
General  Government  is  pursuing,"  would  be,  in  his  opinion, 
"a  sort  of  political  suicide."  To  integrity  and  capacity,  as 
qualifications  for  high  civil  office,  he  added  that  of  ' '  marked 
eminence  before  the  country,  not  only  as  the  more  likely 
to  be  serviceable,  but  because  the  public  will  more  readily 
trust  them."  As  in  appointments,  so  in  the  conduct  of 
affairs,  prudence,  conciliation,  and  accommodation  carried 
the  experiment  successfully  along,  while  firmness  in  essen- 
tials was  equally  present,  as  when,  at  a  later  day,  the  sup- 
pression of  the  whisky  rebellion  and  the  maintenance  of 
H.  Mis.  108 2 


1 8  Address  of  Chief  Justice  Fuller. 

neutrality  in  the  war  between  France  and  England  gave  in- 
formation at  home  that  there  existed  a  central  Government 
strong  enough  to  suppress  domestic  insurrection,  and  abroad 
that  a  new  and  self-reliant  power  had  been  born  into  the 
family  of  nations. 

The  course  taken  in  all  matters,  whether  great  or  small, 
was  the  result  of  careful  consideration  and  the  exercise  of 
deliberate  judgment  as  to  the  effect  of  what  was  done,  or 
forborne  to  be  done,  upon  the  success  of  the  newly  con- 
stnicted  fabric.  Thus,  the  regulation  of  official  behavior 
was  deemed  a  matter  of  such  consequence  that  Adams,  Jay, 
Hamilton,  and  Madison  were  consulted  upon  it;  for  although 
republican  simplicity  had  been  substituted  for  monarchy 
and  titles,  and  was  held  inconsistent  with  concession  of 
superiority  by  reason  of  occupancy  of  official  station,  yet  the 
transition  could  not  be  violently  made,  and  the  people  were, 
in  any  event,  entitled  to  expect  their  agents  to  sustain  with 
dignity  the  high  positions  to  which  they  had  been  called. 

During  the  entire  Presidency  of  Washington,  upon  the 
details  of  which  it  is  impracticable  here  to  dwell,  time  for 
solidification  was  the  dominant  thought.  The  infant  giant 
could  defend  himself  even  in  his  cradle ;  but  to  become  the 
Colossus  of  Washington's  hopes,  the  gristle  must  have  op- 
portunity to  harden. 

After  more  than  seven  years  of  devotion  to  the  interests 
committed  to  his  charge,  and  intense  watchfulness  over  the 
adjustment  and  working  of  the  machinery  of  the  new  system, 
having  determined  upon  his  own  retirement,  thereby  prac- 
tically assigning  a  limit  to  the  period  during  which  the 
office  could  with  propriety  be  occupied  by  his  successors, 
still  regarding  the  problem  as  not  solved,  and  still  anxiously 
desiring  to  contribute  to  the  last  to  the  welfare  of  the  con- 
stant object  of  his  veneration  and  love,  he  gives  to  his 
countrymen  in  the  farewell  of  "an  old  and  affectionate 
friend"  the  results  of  his  observations  a'nd  of  his  reflections 
on  the  operation  of  the  great  scheme  he  had  assisted  in 


Address  of  Chief  Justice  Fuller.  19 

creating  and  had  so  far  commended  to  the  people  by  his 
administration  of  its  provisions. 

Punctilious  as  he  was  in  official  observances,  and  dear  as 
his  home  and  his  own  State  were  to  him,  this  address  was 
one  that  rose  above  home,  and  State,  and  official  place;  that 
brought  him  near,  not  simply  to  the  people  to  whom  it  was 
immediately  directed,  but  to  that  great  coming  multitude 
whom  no  man  could  number,  and  towards  which  he  felt  the 
pathetic  attachment  of  a  noble  and  prophetic  soul.  And  so 
he  dates  it,  not  from  Mount  Vernon  nor  from  his  official 
residence,  but  from  the  "United  States." 

Hamilton,  Madison,  and  Jay  had,  in  the  series  of  essays 
in  advocacy  of  the  Constitution,  largely  aided  in  bringing 
about  its  ratification,  and  displayed  wonderful  comprehen- 
siveness of  view,  depth  of  wisdom,  and  sagacity  of  reflection 
in  their  treatment  of  the  topics  involved.  Throughout 
Washington's  administration  they  had  to  the  utmost  assisted 
in  the  successful  carrying  on  of  the  Government,  in  the 
Cabinet,  in  Congress,  upon  the  bench,  or  in  diplomatic 
station,  and  to  them  as  tried  and  true  friends  and  men  of  a 
statesmanship  as  broad  as  the  country,  Washington  turned 
at  one  time  and  another  for  advice  in  the  preparation  of 
these  closing  words. 

Notwithstanding  that  innate  modesty  which  had  always 
induced  a  certain  real  diffidence  in  assuming  station,  he  was 
conscious  of  his  position  as  founder  of  the  state  ;  he  felt  that 
every  utterance  in  this  closing  benediction  would  be  cher- 
ished by  coming  generations  as  disinterested  advice,  based 
on  experience  and  knowledge  and  illuminated  by  the  sin- 
cerest  affection,  and  he  invited  the  careful  scrutiny  of  his 
friends  that  it  might  "be  handed  to  the  public  in  an  honest, 
unaffected,  simple  garb. "  But  the  work  was  his  own,  as 
all  his  work  was.  The  virtue  went  out  of  him,  even  when 
he  used  the  hand  of  another. 

If  we  turn  to  this  remarkable  document  and  compare  the 
line  of  conduct  therein  recommended  with  the  course  of 


20  Address  of  Chief  Justice  Fuller. 

events  during  the  century — the  advice  given  with  the  results 
of  experience — we  are  amazed  at  the  wonderful  sagacity  and 
precision  with  which  it  lays  down  the  general  principles 
through  whose  application  the  safety  and  prosperity  of  the 
Republic  have  been  secured.  To  cherish  the  public  credit 
and  promote  religion,  morality,  and  education  were  obvious 
recommendations.  Economy  in  public  expense,  vigorous 
exertion  to  discharge  debt  unavoidably  occasioned,  acqui- 
escence in  necessary  taxation,  and  candid  construction  of 
governmental  action  in  the  selection  of  its  proper  objects, 
were  all  parts  of  the  first  of  these.  The  increase  of  net  or- 
dinary expenditures  from  three  millions  to  two  hundred  and 
sixty-eight  millions  of  dollars,  and  of  net  ordinary  receipts 
from  four  and  one-half  to  three  hundred  and  eighty  millions 
of  dollars,  renders  the  practice  of  economy,  as  contradis- 
tinguished from  wastefulness,  as  commendable  to-day  as 
then,  but  it  must  be  a  judicious  economy  ;  for,  as  Washing- 
ton said,  timely  disbursements  frequently  prevent  much 
larger. 

The  extinction  of  the  public  debt  at  one  time,  and  the 
marvelous  reduction  within  a  quarter  of  a  century  of  its 
creation  of  a  later  public  debt  of  more  than  twenty-five 
hundred  millions  of  dollars,  demonstrate  practical  adherence 
to  the  rule  laid  down.  It  is  true  that  "the  great  material 
prosperity  which  has  attended  our  growth  has  enabled  us  to 
meet  an  enormous  burden  of  taxation  with  comparative 
ease,  but  it  is  nevertheless  also  true  that  the  general  judg- 
ment has  never  wavered  upon  the  question  of  the  sacred 
observance  of  plighted  faith  ;  and  if  at  any  moment  the 
removal  of  the  bars  designed  to  imprison  the  powerful  giant 
of  a  paper  currency  seemed  to  imperil  the  preservation  of 
the  public  honor,  the  sturdy  common  sense  of  the  people 
has  checked  through  their  representatives  the  dangerous 
tendency  before  it  has  gone  too  far. 

Education  was  one  of  the  two  hooks  (the  other  was  local 
self-government)  upon  which  the  continuance  of  republican 
government  was  considered  as  absolutely  hanging. 


Address  of  Chief  Justice  Fuller.  21 

The  action  of  the  Continental  Congress  in  respect  to  the 
Western  territory  was  next  in  importance  to  that  on  inde- 
pendence and  union.  Apart  from  its  political  significance 
we  recall  the  familiar  fact  that  one  section  out  of  every 
township  was  reserved  under  the  ordinances  of  1785  and 
1787  for, the  maintenance  of  schools,  because  religion,  mo- 
rality, and  knowledge  were  considered  essential  to  good  gov- 
ernment and  the  happiness  of  mankind.  The  one  section 
has  been  made  two,  and  many  millions  of  acres  have  been 
granted  for  the  endowment  of  universities,  of  normal,  sci- 
entific, and  mining  schools,  and  institutions  for  the  benefit 
of  agriculture  and  the  mechanic  arts,  including  from  three' 
hundred  and  fifty  to  four  hundred  and  fifty  thousand  acres 
for  educational  and  charitable  institutions,  to  each  of  the 
new  States  recently  admitted,  by  an  act  appropriately  passed 
into  law  on  the  birthday  of  Washington.  A  thousand  uni- 
versities, colleges,  and  institutions  of  learning,  twelve  mill- 
ions of  children  attending  two  hundred  thousand  public 
schools,  with  three  hundred  and  sixty  thousand  teachers,  at 
an  expenditure  of  one  hundred  and  twenty-five  millions,  and 
with  property  worth  two  hundred  millions,  and  sixty-two 
million  dollars  in  private  benefactions  for  education  in  the 
decade  of  the  last  census,  testify  that  the  importance  of  edu- 
cation is  not  underestimated  in  a  country  whose  institutions 
are  dependent  upon  the  intelligence  of  the  people. 

Washington  insists  that  national  morality  can  not  prevail 
in  exclusion  of  religious  principle,  though  the  influence  of 
refined  education  on  minds  of  a  peculiar  structure  may  have 
induced  an  opposite  conclusion. 

History  accords  with  this  view.  Plutarch  said,  "You 
may  travel  over  the  world  and  you  may  find  cities  without 
walls,  without  king,  without  mint,  without  theater  or  gym- 
nasium, but  you  will  never  find  a  city  without  God,  with- 
out prayer,  without  oracle,  without  sacrifice;"  and  the 
eighteen  centuries  since  his  day  confirm  the  truth  of  his 
words. 


22 


Address  of  Chief  Justice  Fuller. 


"Take  from  me,"  said  Bismarck,  "my  faith  in  a  divine 
order  which  has  destined  this  German  nation  for  something 
good  and  great,  and  you  take  from  me  my  fatherland." 

Washington  declares  that  "the  mere  politician,  equally 
with  the  pious  man,  ought  to  respect  and  cherish  religion 
and  morality  as  the  firmest  props  of  the  duties  of  men  and 
citizens. "  He  did  not  mean  that  the  value  of  trust  and  faith 
has  no  relation  to  the  reality  of  the  objects  of  that  trust  and 
faith,  nor  that  those  to  whom  he  referred  should  indulge  in 
religious  observances  as  mere  mummeries  to  deceive,  while 
smiling  among  themselves,  as  Cicero  with  his  fellow-augurs, 
nor  that  faith  should  be  betrayed  by  accommodation  to  super- 
stition, as  in  the  action  of  the  town  clerk  of  Ephesus,  but  he 
demanded  that  they  should  recognize  in  fact  the  indispen- 
sability  of  these  supports  of  political  prosperity. 

And  here  again  the  answer  of  the  century's  watchman 
tells  that  the  night  is  passing. 

Crime,  drunkenness,  pauperism  have  steadily  decreased 
in  proportion  as  population  has  increased;  philanthropic 
agencies  have  multiplied,  moral  sensitiveness  has  become 
keener,  and  higher  standards  of  personal  and  official  con- 
duct have  come  to  be  required,  while  at  the  same  time  the 
statistics  of  religious  progress  exhibit  wonderful  and  most 
gratifying  results. 

Washington  had  never  permitted  his  public  action  to  be 
influenced  by  personal  affection  or  personal  hostility,  and  in 
urging  the  avoidance  of  political  connections  or  personal 
alliances  with  any  portion  of  the  foreign  world,  he  character- 
istically condemned  indulgence  in  an  inveterate  antipathy 
towards  particular  nations  and  a  passionate  attachment  for 
others,  while  observing  good  faith  and  justice  towards  all. 
No  reason  existed  for  becoming  implicated  in  the  ordinary 
vicissitudes  of  the  politics  of  Europe,  or  the  ordinary  com- 
binations and  collisions  of  her  friendships  or  enmities.  In- 
tervention meant  war,  not  arbitration;  the  assumption, of 
obligation  meant  force,  not  words.  No  field  was  to  be 


Address  of  Chief  Justice  Fuller.  23 

opened  here  for  foreign  intrigues,  and  no  necessity  created 
here  for  standing  armies  and  the  domination  of  the  civil  by 
the  military  authority. 

So  scrupulous  was  Washington's  abstinence  from  the 
slightest  appearance  of  interference  that,  notwithstanding 
his  tender  friendship  for  La  Fayette,  he  would  not  make 
official  application  for  his  release  from  Olmutz.  So  absolute 
was  his  conviction  that  this  country  must  not  become  a 
make-weight  in  Europe's  balances  of  power  that  he  sternly 
held  it  to  neutrality  under  circumstances  which  would  have 
rendered  it  impossible  for  any  other  man  to  do  so.  Such 
has  been  the  policy  unchangeably  pursued,  but  it  has  not 
required  the  concealment  of  our  sympathy  with  all  who 
have  wished  to  put  American  institutional  ideas  into  practi- 
cal operation,  or  our  confidence  in  their  ultimate  prevalence. 
Nor  has  the  rule  prevented  the  Republic  from  the  declara- 
tion that  it  should  take  its  own  course  in  case  of  the  inter- 
ference by  other  nations  with  the  primary  interests  of 
America. 

In  the  lapse  of  years  international  relations  have  been 
constantly  assuming  larger  importance  with  the  growth  of 
the  country  and  the  world  and  the  increasing  nearness  of 
intercommunication.  We  are  justified  in  claiming  that  the 
delicate  and  difficult  function  of  government  involved  has 
been  from  the  first  discharge^  in  so  admirable  a  manner 
that  the  solution  of  the  grave  questions  of  the  future  may 
be  awaited  without  anxiety. 

It  is  matter  of  congratulation  that  the  first  year  of  our 
second  century  witnesses  the  representatives  of  the  three 
Americas  engaged  in  the  effort  to  increase  the  facilities  of 
commercial  intercourse,  "consulting  the  natural  course  of 
things,  diffusing  and  diversifying  by  gentle  means  the 
streams  of  intercourse,  but  forcing  nothing, ' '  success  in 
which  must  knit  closer  the  ties  of  fraternal  friendship,  and 
brfng  the  peoples  of  the  two  American  continents  into 
harmonious  control  of  the  hemisphere. 


24  Address  of  Chief  Justice  fuller. 

The  course  of  events  has  equally  shown  the  profound 
wisdom  of  the  propositions  of  the  Farewell  Address  bearing 
directly  on  the  form  of  government  delineated  in  the  Federal 
Constitution. 

First  of  these  is  the  necessity  of  the  preservation  of  the 
distribution  of  powers  and  of  resistance  to  any  encroach- 
ment by  one  department  upon  another. 

The  executive  power  was  vested  in  the  President,  but  he 
had  a  voting  power  in  the  right  to  veto,  and  the  power  of 
initiation  as  to  treaties,  which  became  binding  with  the 
advice  and  consent  of  the  Senate. 

The  interposition  of  the  latter  was  also  permitted  by  the 
requisition  of  assent  in  the  confirmation  of  appointments, 
and  it  could  sit  in  judgment  on  the  President  if  articles  of 
impeachment  were  presented.  In  some  particulars,  there- 
fore, the  two  departments  approached  each  other  in  the 
exercise  of  functions  appropriate  to  each. 

This  made  it  all  the  more  important  that  there  should  be 
no  invasion  of  the  one  by  the  other.  No  effort  to  diminish 
the  executive  authority  or  to  interfere  with  the  exercise  of 
its  legitimate  discretion  has  commanded  the  support  of  the 
public  voice,  and  impeachment  has  not  been  considered  a 
proper  resort  to  reconcile  differences  of  judgment,  however 
serious. 

The  right  to  initiate  and  to  pass  laws  having  been  lodged 
in  Congress,  the  balance  of  power  was  actually  there  reposed, 
and  the  danger  of  encroachment  would  naturally  present 
itself  from  that  quarter. 

And  here  the  Federal  judiciary  was  interposed  as  a  co- 
ordinate department,  with  power  to  determine  when  the  lim- 
itations of  the  fundamental  law  were  transgressed.  Without 
an  exact  precedent,  the  creation  of  a  tribunal  possessed  of 
that  power  was  the  natural  result  of  the  existence  of  a 
written  constitution  ;  for  to  leave  to  the  instrumentalities 
by  which  governmental  power  is  exercised  the  determina- 
tion of  boundaries  upon  it  would  dispense  with  them  alto- 
gether. 


Address  of  Chief  Justice  Fuller.  25 

In  England  the  executive  and  legislative  powers  are 
practically  vested  in  Parliament  and  exercised  by  the  Cab- 
inet, which  amounts  to  a  committee  of  the  Commons,  act- 
ing with  the  additional  power  which  secret  agreement  on  a 
given  course  imparts.  The  constitution  is  what  Parliament 
makes  it,  and  the  judicial  tribunals  only  interpret  and  apply 
the  action  of  that  body,  being  necessarily  destitute  of  the 
power  to  hold  such  action  void  by  reference  to  any  higher 
law  than  its  own  enactments. 

Not  so  with  us.  Every  act  of  Congress,  every  act  of  the 
State  legislatures,  every  part  of  the  constitution  of  any  State, 
if  repugnant  to  the  Constitution  of  the  United  States,  is 
void,  and  to  be  so  treated.  The  Supreme  Court,  by  the  de- 
cision of  cases  in  which  such  acts  or  provisions  are  drawn-in 
question  and  in  the  exercise  of  judicial  functions,  renders 
the  Constitution  in  reality  as  well  as  in  name  the  supreme 
law  of  the  land. 

Its  judgments  command  the  assent  of  Congress  and  the 
Executive,  the  States  and  the  people,  alike,  and  it  is  this 
unique  arbitrament  that  has  challenged  the  admiration  of 
the  world. 

The  court  can  not  be  abolished  by  Congress,  but  the  num- 
ber of  its  judges  may  be  increased,  or  diminished  on  the 
occurrence  of  vacancies,  and  so,  while  its  jurisdiction  can 
not  be  impaired,  the  exercise  of  it  may  be  curtailed. 

Nevertheless,  no  legislation  to  control  it  in  any  way  has 
ever  been  approved  by  definite  public  opinion,  and  the  tri- 
bunal remains  in  the  complete  discharge  of  the  vital  and 
important  functions  it  was  created  to  perform. 

Scrupulously  abstaining  from  the  decision  of  strictly  po- 
litical questions  and  from  the  performance  of  other  than 
judicial  duties ;  never  grasping  an  ungranted  jurisdiction 
and  never  shrinking  from  the  exercise  of  that  conferred  upon 
it,  it  commands  the  reverence  of  a  law-abiding  people. 

Again,  Washington  urges  not  only  that  his  countrymen 
shall  steadily  discountenance  irregular  opposition  to  the  ac- 


26  Address  of  Chief  Justice  Fuller. 

knowledged  authority  of  the  Government,  and  resist  with 
care  the  spirit  of  innovation  upon  its  principles,  but  shall 
oppose  any  change  in  the  system  except  by  amendment  in 
the  mode  provided,  particularly  warning  them,  as  fearful  of 
objection  to  the  pressure  of  the  Government,  that  the  energy 
of  the  scheme  must  not  be  impaired,  as  vigor  is  not  only 
required  to  manage  the  common  interests  throughout  so  ex- 
tensive a  country,  but  is  necessary  to  protect  liberty  itself. 

In  nor  part  of  the  Constitution  was  greater  sagacity  dis- 
played than  in  the  provision  for  its  amendment.  No  State, 
without  its  consent,  could  be  deprived  of  its  equal  suffrage 
in  the  Senate,  but  otherwise  (with  an  exception  now  imma- 
terial) the  instrument  might  be  amended  upon  the  concur- 
rence of  two-thirds  of  both  houses  and  the  ratification  of 
the  legislatures  or  conventions  of  three-fourths  of  the  several 
States,  or  through  a  Federal  convention,  when  applied  for 
by  the  legislatures  of  two-thirds  of  the  States,  and  upon  like 
ratification. 

It  was  designed  that  the  ultimate  sovereignty  thus  reposed 
should  not  be  called  into  play,  except  through  this  slow  and 
deliberate  process,  which  would  give  time  for  mere  hypoth- 
esis and  opinion  to  exhaust  themselves,  and  the  conclusion 
reached  to  be  the  result  of  gravity  of  thought  and  judgment, 
and  of  the  concurrence  of  substantially  every  part  of  the 
country. 

The  first  ten  amendments  hardly  come  within  the  appli- 
cation of  the  principle,  as  they  were  in  substance  requested 
by  many  of  the  States  at  the  time  of  ratification.  In  the 
Pennsylvania  convention,  James  Wilson  declared  that  the 
subject  of  a  bill  of  rights  was  not  mentioned  in  the  consti- 
tutional convention  until  within  three  days  of  its  adjourn- 
ment, and  even  then  no  direct  motion  upon  the  subject  was 
offered,  and  that  such  a  bill  was  entirely  unnecessary  in  a 
government  having  none  but  enumerated  powers  ;  but  Jef- 
ferson urged  from  Paris  that  a  bill  of  rights  was  ' '  what  the 
people  are  entitled  to  against  every  government  on  earth, 


Address  of  Chief  justice  fuller.  27 

general  or  particular, ' '  and  that  one  ought  to  be  added, 
' '  providing  clearly  and  without  the  aid  of  sophism,  for  free- 
dom of  religion,  freedom  of  the  press,  protection  against 
standing  armies,  restriction  of  monopolies,  the  eternal  and 
unremitting  force  of  the  habeas  corpus  laws,  and  trials  by 
jury  in  all  matters  of  fact  triable  by  the  laws  of  the  land, 
and  not  by  the  laws  of  nations. ' '  This  view  prevailed,  but 
in  order  that  the  affirmance  of  certain  rights  might  not  dis- 
parage others  or  lead  to  implications  in  favor  of  the  posses- 
sion of  other  powers,  it  was  added  that  the  enumeration  of 
certain  rights  should  not  be  construed  to  deny  or  disparage 
others  retained  by  the  people,  and  that  the  powers  not  dele- 
gated were  reserved. 

Congress,  in  the  preamble  to  these  amendments,  and 
Washington,  in  his  inaugural,  commend  their  adoption  out 
of  regard  for  the  public  harmony  and  a  reference  for  the 
characteristic  rights  of  freemen. 

The  eleventh  inhibited  the  extension  by  construction,  in 
the  particular  named,  of  the  Federal  judicial  power,  and  the 
twelfth  related  to  matters  of  detail  in  the  election  of  Presi- 
dent and  Vice-President.  No  one  of  the  twelve  was  in  re- 
straint of  State  action. 

Sixty  years  elapsed  before  the  ratification  of  the  thirteenth, 
fourteenth,  and  fifteenth  amendments.  These  definitely  dis- 
posed of  the  subject  of  slavery,  that  Serbonian  bog  'twixt 
the  extreme  views  of  the  two  schools  of  political  thought 
dividing  the  country — views  which,  except  for  the  existence 
of  that  institution,  might  never  have  been  pushed  to  an  ex- 
treme, but  might  have  continued  peacefully  to  operate  in 
the  production  of  a  golden  mean  between  the  absorption  of 
power  by  the  central  and  its  diffusion  among  the  local  gov- 
ernments. And  by  the  fourteenth  an  additional  guaranty 
was  furnished  against  the  arbitrary  exercise  by  the  States 
of  the  powers  of  government,  unrestrained  by  the  estab- 
lished principles  of  private  rights  and  distributive  justice. 

Undoubtedlv  the  effect  of  these  later  amendments  was 


28  Address  of  Chief  Justice  Fuller. 

to  increase  the  power  of  Congress,  but  there  was  no  revolu- 
tionary change.  It  is  as  true  of  the  existing  government 
as  it  was  of  the  proposed  government,  that  it  must  stand  or 
fall  with  the  State  governments. 

Added  provisions  for  the  protection  of  personal  rights  in- 
volved to  that  extent  additional  powers,  but  the  essential 
elements  of  the  structure  remained  unchanged. 

In  other  words,  while  certain  obstructions  to  its  working 
have  been  removed,  the  clock-work  has  not  been  thrown 
out  of  gear,  but  the  pendulfim  continues  to  swing  through 
its  appointed  arc  and  the  vast  machinery  to  move  noiselessly 
and  easily  to  and  fro,  marking  the  orderly  progress  of  a  great 
people  in  the  achievement  of  happiness  by  the  exercise  of 
self-government. 

But  while  direct  alterations  have  been  few,  the  funda- 
mental law  has  been  developed  in  the  evolution  of  national 
growth,  as  Washington,  indeed,  anticipated.  "  Time  and 
habit,"  said  he,  "are  at  least  as  necessary  to  fix  the  true 
character  of  government  as  of  other  human  institutions  ; " 
and  ' '  experience  is  the  surest  standard  by  which  to  fix  the 
real  tendency  of  the  existing  constitution  of  a  country." 

In  this  he  applies  the  language  of  Hume,  and  speaks  in 
the  spirit  of  the  observation  of  Bacon,  that  "rightly  is  truth 
called  the  daughter  of  time,  not  of  authority." 

Time,  habit,  experience,  legislation,  usage  may  have  as- 
sisted in  expanding  the  Constitution  in  the  quiet,  imper- 
ceptible manner  in  which  nature  adapts  itself  to  new  con- 
ditions, though  remaining  still  the  same. 

Yet  its  chief  growth  is  to  be  found  in  the  interpretation 
of  its  provisions  by  the  tribunal  upon  which  that  delicate 
and  responsible  duty  was  imposed.  And  in  that  view  what 
"a  debt  immense  of  endless  gratitude"  is  owed  to  those 
luminous  decisions  of  John  Marshall,  which  placed  the 
principles  of  the  Constitution  upon  an  impregnable  basis 
and  rendered  an  experimental  system  permanent. 

Renowned  and  venerable  name  !     It  was  he  who  liberated 


Address  of  Chief  Justice  Fuller.  29 

the  spirit  which  lived  within  the  Constitution — the  mind 
infused  "through  every  member  of  the  mighty  mass" — so 
that  it  might  "pervade,  sustain,  and  actuate  the  whole." 

The  fact  that  the  conclusions  reached  by  the  court  and 
set  forth  by  the  persuasive  and  logical  reasoning  of  the  great 
Chief-Justice  did  not  at  the  moment  move  in  the  direction 
of  public  opinion,  but  finally  met  with  the  entire  approval 
of  the  matured  judgment  of  the  people,  furnishes  an  im- 
pressive illustration  of  the  working  of  our  system  of  govern- 
ment. 

Doubtless,  in  many  instances,  the  Constitution  has  been 
subjected  to  strains  which  have  tested  its  elasticity  without 
breaking  the  texture,  but  the  watchfulness  of  party  has  aided 
to  keep  the  balance  true,  absolute  infraction  has  been  dep- 
recated or  denied,  and  a  law-loving  and  law-abiding  people 
has  welcomed  the  rebound  which  restored  the  rigid  outline 
and  even  tenor  of  its  way. 

The  departing  statesman  dwells  with  insistence,  on  the 
grounds  both  of  interest  and  sensibility,  upon  the  paramount 
importance  of  the  Union  and  of  that  unity  of  government 
which  makes  of  those  who  live  under  it  one  people  and  one 
nation,  and  will,  he  hopes,  induce  all  its  citizens,  whether 
by  birth  or  choice,  to  glory  in  the  name  ' '  American. ' ' 

Here,  the  ideal  which  influenced  his  conduct  may  be  read 
between  the  lines — the  ideal  of  a  powerful  and  harmonious 
people,  possessed  of  freedom  because  capable  of  self-restraint, 
and  working  out  the  destinies  of  an  ocean-bound  republic, 
whose  example  should  be  a  message  of  glad  tidings  to  all 
the  earth. 

And  the  realization  of  that  ideal  involved  a  patriotism  not 
based  upon  the  dictates  of  interest,  but  springing  from  de- 
votion of  the  heart,  and  pride  in  the  object  of  that  devotion. 

What  Washington  desired,  as  Lodge's  fine  biography 
makes  entirely  clear,  was,  that  the  people  should  become 
saturated  with  the  principles  of  national  unity  and  love  of 
country,  should  possess  an  "American  character,"  should 


30  Address  of  Chief  Justice  Fuller. 

never  forget  that  they  were  "Americans."  Hence  he  op- 
posed education  abroad,  lest  our  youth  might  contract  princi- 
ples unfriendly  to  republican  government;  and  discouraged 
immigration  except  of  those  who,  by  "an  intermixture  with 
our  people,"  could  themselves,  or  their  descendants,  "get 
assimilated  to  our  customs,  measures,  and  laws;  in  a  word, 
soon  become  one  people." 

To  be  an  American  was  to  be  part  and  parcel  of  American 
ideas,  institutions,  prosperity,  and  progress.  It  was  to  be 
like-minded  with  the  patriotic  leaders  who  have  served  the 
cause  of  their  native  or  adopted  land,  from  Washington  to 
Lincoln.  It  was  to  be  convinced  of  the  virtues  of  republi- 
can government  as  the  bulwark  of  the  true  and  genuine 
liberties  of  mankind,  which  would  ultimately  transmute 
suffering  through  ignorance  into  happiness  through  light. 

Who  would  not  glory  in  the  name  American,  when  it 
carries  with  it  such  illustrative  types  as  Washington,  and 
Franklin,  and  Samuel  Adams,  and  Jefferson,  and  such  a 
type  as  Lincoln,  whose  very  faults  were  American,  as  were 
the  virtues  of  his  sad  and  heroic  soul? 

As  the  lust  for  domination  is  in  perpetual  conflict  with 
the  longing  to  be  free,  so  the  tendency  to  concentration 
struggles  perpetually  with  the  tendency  to  diffuse. 

It  is  in  the  maintenance  of  the  equilibrium  that  the 
largest  liberty  consistent  with  the  greatest  progress  has  been 
found.  And  this  is  as  true  between  the  States  and  the  Fed- 
eral Government  as  between  the  individual  and  the  State. 

But  while  the  play  of  the  two  forces  is  a  natural  one,  the 
gravitation  is  to  the  center,  with  human  nature  as  it  is. 

The  passage  of  the  century,  with  the  vast  material  devel- 
opment of  the  country,  has  brought  this  strikingly  home  to 
us  in  the  increased  importance  of  the  Federal  Government 
in  prestige  and  power,  as  compared  with  that  of  the  State 
governments  in  the  time  of  Washington.  Position  on  the 
Supreme  Bench  or  Cabinet  place  might  still  be  declined  for 
personal  reasons,  but  not  because  of  preference  for  the  head- 


Address  of  Chief  justice  Fuller.  3* 

ship  of  a  State  government,  or  of  a  State  tribunal,  and  no 
punctilio  would  cause  the  governor  of  to-day  to  hesitate 
upon  a  question  of  official  etiquette  when  the  President. 
visits  a  State  capital. 

Rapidity  and  ease  of  communication  by  railroad,  tele- 
graph, and  post ;  the  handling  of  the  vast  income  and  ex^ 
penditure  of  the  Federal  Treasury,  and  the  knitting  together 
of  the  innumerable  ties  of  family,  social,  and  business  rela- 
tions have  created  a  solidarity  which  demands,  in  the 
regulation  of  commerce,  the  management  of  financial  affairs,, 
and  the  like,  the  interposition  of  Federal  authority.  The 
national  banking  system,  the  Interstate  Commerce  Com- 
mission, the  Agricultural  Department,  the  Labor  and  Edu-^ 
cational  Bureaus,  the  National  Board  of  Health,  indicate  the 
drift  toward  the  exertion  of  the  national  will,  a  natural  and. 
perhaps  inevitable  result  of  that  unity  which  formed  the 
object  of  Washington's  desire. 

But  what  he  wished  was  solidarity  without  centralization 
in  destruction  of  local  regulation,  for  it  must  not  be  assumed 
that  he  did  not  realize  the  vital  importance  of  the  preserva- 
tion of  local  self-government  through  the  States.  To  realize 
its  great  destiny  the  country  must  oppose  externally  a  con-* 
solidated  front  and  contain  within  itself  a  single  people 
only ;  but  popular  government  must  be  preserved,  and  the 
doubt  was  whether  a  common  government  of  the  popular- 
form  could  embrace  so  large  a  sphere. 

Hence  the  earnestness  with  which  Washington  invoked 
the  spirit  of  essential  unity  through  pride  and  affection  to. 
move  upon  the  face  of  the  waters.  When  the  new  political 
world  had  fairly  taken  form  and  substance  other  considera- 
tions would  resume  their  due  importance.  He  was  pro-, 
foundly  disturbed  by  the  apprehension  that  different  por-, 
tions  of  the  population  might  become,  through  contradictory 
interests,  in  effect  rival  peoples,  and  the  Union  be  destroyed^ 
by  the  contention  for  mastery  between  them.  His  sagacious, 
mind  perceived  the  danger  arising  from  the  social  and  eco,*. 


32  Address  of  Chief  Justice  Fuller. 

nomic  condition  produced  by  an  institution  with  which  the 
framers  of  the  Constitution  had  found  themselves  unable  to 
deal,  and  he  deprecated  an  appeal  to  the  last  reason  of  kings 
in  preservation  of  one  government  over  our  whole  domain. 

Yet  that  appeal  was  fortunately  so  long  delayed  that  when 
it  came  the  civil  war  determined  the  perpetuity  and  indis- 
solubility  of  the  Union,  without  the  loss  of  distinct  and 
individual  existence  or  of  the  right  of  self-government  by 
the  States. 

This  conflict  demonstrated  that  no  part  of  the  country 
was  destitute  of  that  old  fighting  spirit,  which  rouses  at  the 
invocation  of  force  through  arms,  and  which  long  years  of 
prosperity  could  not  weaken  or  destroy,  and,  at  the  same 
time,  that  gigantic  armies  drawn  from  the  ranks  of  a  citizen 
soldiery,  however  skilled  they  may  become  in  the  arts  of 
war,  on  the  cessation  of  hostilities  at  once  resume  the  nor- 
mal cultivation  of  the  arts  of  peace. 

And  from  an  apparent  invasion  of  the  carefully  con- 
structed scheme  to  secure  popular  government,  popular  gov- 
ernment has  obtained  a  wider  scope  and  renewed  power, 
and  from  an  apparent  industrial  overthrow  has  come  an 
unexampled  industrial  development.  "Out  of  the  eater 
came  forth  meat,  and  out  of  the  strong  came  forth  sweet- 
ness. ' ' 

The  waste  of  war  is  always  rapidly  replaced,  and  in  its 
effect  on  institutions  time  may  repair,  its  injuries  without 
weakening  its  benefits. 

Is  it  possible  to  conceive  of  a  more  searching  test  of  the 
wisdom  and  lasting  quality  of  our  form  of  government  than 
that  applied  by  the  civil  war?  Is  it  possible  to  conceive  of 
a  more  convincing  demonstration  than  the  reconciliation 
which  has  followed  the  conclusion  of  the  struggle,  and  the 
complete  re-instatement  of  the  system  in  harmonious  opera- 
tion over  the  entire  national  domain  ?  No  conquered  prov- 
inces perpetuated  personal  animosities,  and  by  the  fact  of 
their  existence,  through  despotic  rule  over  part,  changed 


Address  of  Chief  Justice  Fuller.  33 

the  government  over  all.  On  the  contrary,  the  States,  vital 
parts  of  the  system,  and  in  whose  annihilation  the  system 
perishes,  resumed  the  relations  temporarily  suspended,  and' 
the  continuance  of  local  self-government  on  its  accustomed 
course  prevented  the  old  connection  from  carrying  with  it 
the  bitterness  of  enforced  change.  It  was  the  triumph  of 
the  machinery  that  its  practical  working  so  speedily  assumed 
its  normal  movement,  substantially  uninjured  by  the  con- 
vulsion that  had  shaken  it. 

And  as  the  wheels  within  the  wheels  revolve,  the  aspira- 
tion finds  a  response  in  every  heart:  "Come  from  the  four 
winds,  O  breath,  and  breathe  upon  these  slain  that  they 
may  live" — live  with  their  reunited  brethren,  one  in  the 
hand  of  God. 

Finally,  the  country  is  warned  against  the  baleful  effects 
of  the  spirit  of  party  as  the  worst  enemy  of  governments  of 
the  popular  form. 

Franklin  wrote  that  all  great  affairs  are  carried  on  by  par- 
ties, but  that  as  soon  as  a  party  has  gained  its  general  point 
each  member  becomes  intent  upon  his  particular  interest ; 
that  few  in  public  affairs  act  from  a  mere  view  of  the  good 
of  their  country,  and  fewer  still  with  a  view  to  the  good  of 
mankind.  But  these  observations  would,  in  the  light  of 
the  history  of  our  country,  be  regarded  as  too  sweeping, 
although  they  suggest  grounds  for  the  objection  of  Wash- 
ington to  the  domination  of  party  spirit. 

Parties  based  on  different  opinions  as  to  the  principles  on 
which  the  Government  is  to  be  conducted  must  necessarily 
exist.  To  them  we  look  for  that  activity  in  the  advocacy 
of  opposing  views  ;  that  watchfulness  over  the  assertion  of 
authority ;  that  keen  debate  as  to  the  course  most  conducive 
to  well-being,  essential  to  the  successful  growth  of  popular 
institutions.  That  voice  of  the  people  which,  when  duly 
given  and  properly  ascertained,  directs  the  action  of  the 
state  is  largely  brought  to  declare  itself  through  the  instru- 
H.  Mis.  1G8 3 


34  Address  of  Chief  Justice  Fuller. 

mentality  of  party.  It  is  this  which  corrects  that  general 
apathy  rightly  regarded  by  De  Tocqueville  as  a  serious 
menace  to  popular  government  because  conducive  to  its 
complete  surrender  to  the  domination  of  its  agents  if  they 
will  but  relieve  responsibility  and  gratify  desire.  But  if  the 
spirit  of  party  is  so  extreme  that  party  itself  becomes  a  des- 
potism, or,  if  government  itself  becomes  nothing  but  organ- 
ized party,  then  the  danger  apprehended  by  Washington  is 
upon  us. 

With  the  increase  of  population  and  wealth  and  power; 
with  the  spoils  of  office  dependent  upon  the  elections;  with 
vast  interests  affected  by  legislation,  as  in  the  care  and  disposi- 
tion of  public  property,  the  raising  of  public  revenue,  the 
grant  or  regulation  of  corporate  powers  and  monopolistic 
combinations,  the  danger  is  that  corruption,  always  insid- 
ious, always  aggressive,  and  always  dangerous  to  popular 
government,  will  control  party  machinery  to  effect  its  ends, 
tempt  public  men  into  accepting  favors  at  its  hands  by  tak- 
ing office  purchased  by  its  influence,  and  flourish  in  rank 
luxuriance  under  the  shelter  of  a  system  which  confounds 
the  honest  and  the  patriotic  with  the  cunning  and  the  prof- 
ligate. An  intelligent  public  opinion  ceases  to  exist  when 
it  can  not  assert  itself,  and  great  measures  and  great  princi- 
ples are  lost  when  elections  degenerate  into  the  mere  regis- 
tration of  the  decrees  of  selfishness  and  greed. 

Whenever  party  spirit  becomes  so  intense  as  to  compass 
such  results  it  will  have  reached  the  height  denounced  by 
Washington,  and  will  realize  in  the  action  it  dictates  the 
terrible  definition  of  despotic  government :  "When  the  sav- 
ages wish  to  eat  fruit -they  cut  down  a  tree  and  pluck  the 
fruit." 

However  difficult  it  may  be  to  fully  appreciate  the  influ- 
ence of  great  men  upon  the  cause  of  civilization,  it  is  im- 
possible to  overestimate  that  of  Washington,  thus  exerted 
through  precept  as  well  as  by  example  In  the  general 
recognition  of  to-day  of  the  effect  of  that  which  he  did,  that 


Address  of  Chief  Justice  Fuller.  35 

which  he  said,  that  which  he  was,  upon  the  public  con- 
science, is  found  the  justification  of  the  confident  claim  that 
popular  government  under  the  form  prescribed  by  the  funda- 
mental law  has  ceased  to  be  an  experiment.  Neither  for- 
eign wars,  nor  attacks  upon  either  of  the  co-ordinate  depart- 
ments, nor  the  irritation  of  a  disputed  national  election,  nor 
territorial  aggrandizement,  nor  the  addition  of  realm  after 
realm  to  the  empire  of  States,  nor  sectional  controversies, 
nor  the  destruction  of  a  great  economical,  social,  and  polit- 
ical institution,  nor  the  shock  of  arms  in  internecine  con- 
flict, have  impaired  the  structure  of  the  Government  or 
subverted  the  orderly  rule  of  the  people. 

But  the  deliverance  vouchsafed  in  time  of  tribulation  is 
as  earnestly  to  be  sought  in  time  of  prosperity,  when  mate- 
rial acquisition  may  deaden  the  spiritual  sense  and  impede 
the  progress  of  human  elevation. 

In  the  growth  of  population;  in  the  expansion  of  com- 
merce, manufactures,  and  the  useful  arts ;  in  progress  in  scien- 
tific discovery  and  invention;  in  the  accumulation  of  wealth; 
in  material  advancement  of  every  kind,  the  century  has 
indeed  been  marvelous.  Steam,  electricity,  gas,  teleg- 
raphy, photography,  have  multiplied  the  instrumentalities 
for  the  exercise  of  human  power.  Science,  philosophy, 
literature,  and  art  have  moved  forward  along  the  lines  of 
prior  achievement.  But  wants  have  multiplied  as  civiliza- 
tion has  advanced,  and  with  multiplied  wants  and  the  in- 
creased freedom  of  the  individual  have  come  the  antagonisms 
inevitably  incident  to  inequality  of  condition,  even  though 
there  is  widely  extended  improvement  upon  the  whole,  and 
often  because  of  it,  and  added  to  them  the  more  serious  dis- 
contents arising  from  the  existence,  notwithstanding  the 
immense  results  of  stimulated  production,  of  privation  and 
distress. 

The  Declaration  asserted  political  equality  and  the  posses- 
sion of  the  inalienable  rights  of  life,  liberty,  and  the  pursuit 
of  happiness,  and  the  future  of  the  individual  was  assumed 


36  Address  of  Chief  Justice  Fuller. 

to  be  secured  in  securing  through  government  that  equality 
and  those  rights. 

In  spite  of  the  violent  overthrow  of  institutions  in  the 
French  revolution,  that  great  convulsion  carried  within  it 
the  same  salutary  principles,  while  a  quickening  outburst  of 
spiritual  energy  marked  the  commencement  of  the  indus- 
trial development  of  England,  and  all  Europe  glowed  with 
the  fires  of  sympathy  with  the  wretched  and  oppressed. 

Throughout  the  hundred  years  thus  introduced  aspiration 
for  the  elevation  of  humanity  has  not  diminished  in  inten- 
sity, and  hope  of  the  general  attainment  of  a  more  exalted 
plane  has  gained  new  strength  in  the  effort  to  remove  or 
mitigate  the  ills  which  have  oppressed  mankind.  The  en- 
hanced valuation  of  human  life,  the  abolition  of  slavery, 
the  increase  of  benevolent  and  charitable  institutions,  the 
large  public  appropriations  and  private  benefactions  to  the 
cause  of  education,  the  wide  diffusion  of  intelligence,  per- 
ceptible growth  in  religion,  morality,  and  fraternal  kindness 
encourage  the  effort  and  give  solid  ground  for  the  hope. 
And  since  the  protection  and  regulation  of  the  rights  of 
individuals,  as  between  themselves  and  as  between  them  and 
the  community,  ultimately  come  to  express  the  will  of  the 
latter,  it  is  not  unreasonable  to  contend  that  the  perfecti- 
bility of  man  is  bound  up  in  the  preservation  of  republican 
institutions. 

Where  the  pressure  upon  the  masses  has  been  intense,  the 
drift  has  been  towards  increased  interference  by  the  State  in 
the  attempt  to  alleviate  inequality  of  condition.  So  long 
-as  that  interference  is  enabling  and  protective  only  to  en- 
able, and  individual  effort  is  not  so  circumscribed  as  to 
destroy  the  self-reliance  of  the  people,  they  move  onward 
with  accelerated  speed  in  intellectual  and  moral  as  well  as 
material  progress;  but  when  man  allows  his  beliefs,  his  fam- 
ily, his  property,  his  labor,  each  of  his  acts,  to  be  subjected 
to  the  omnipotence  of  the  State,  or  is  unmindful  of  the  fact 
that  it  is  the  duty  of  the  people  to  support  the  government 


Address  of  Chief  justice  Fuller.  37 

and  not  of  the  government  to  support  the  people,  such  a 
surrender  of  independence  involves  the  cessation  of  such 
progress  in  its  largest  sense. 

The  statement  that  popular  outbreaks  were  often  as  bene- 
ficial in  the  political  world  as  storms  in  the  physical  was 
defended  upon  the  ground  that,  although  evils,  they  were 
productive  of  good  by  preventing  the  degeneracy  of  govern- 
ment and  nourishing  that  general  attention  to  public  affairs, 
the  absence  of  which  would  be  tantamount  to  the  abdication 
of  self-government. 

But  while  the  rights  to  life,  to  use  one's  faculties  in  all 
lawful  ways,  and  to  acquire  and  enjoy  property  are  morally 
fundamental  rights  antecedent  to  constitutions,  which  do 
not  create,  but  secure  and  protect  them,  yet  it  is  within  the 
power  of  the  State  to  promote  the  health,  peace,  morals, 
education,  and  good  order  of  the  people  by  legislation  to  that 
end,  and  to  regulate  the  use  of  property  in  which  the  public 
has  such  an  interest  as  to  be  entitled  to  assert  control.  In 
this  wide  field  of  regulation  by  law,  and  in  the  reformation 
of  laws  which  are  found  to  promote  inequality,  as  well  as  in 
the  patient  efforts  of  mutual  forbearance  which  the  educa- 
tion of  conflict  produces,  the  direction  of  the  rule  of  the 
people  is  steadily  towards  an  amelioration  not  to  be  found 
in  the  dead  level  of  despotism  nor  in  the  destruction  of 
society  proposed  by  the  anarchist. 

It  is  but  little  more  than  thirty  years  since  the  well-known 
prophecy  was  uttered,  that  with  the  increase  of  population 
and  the  taking  up  of  the  public  lands,  our  institutions  then 
being  really  put  to  the  test,  either  some  Caesar  or  Napoleon 
would  seize  the  reins  of  government,  or  our  Republic  would 
be  plundered  and  laid  waste  as  the  Roman  Empire  had  been, 
but  by  Huns  and  Vandals  engendered  within  our  own  coun- 
try and  by  our  own  institutions. 

The  brilliant  essayist  did  not  comprehend  the  character 
of  our  fundamental  law,  the  securities  carefully  devised  to 
prevent  facility  in  changing  it,  and  the  provisions  which 


197923 


38  Address  of  Chief  Justice  Fuller. 

inhibit  the  subversion  of  individual  freedom,  the  impairment 
of  the  obligation  of  contracts,  and  the  confiscation  of  prop- 
erty, nor  realize  the  practical  operation  of  a  governmental 
scheme  intended  to  secure  that  sober  second  thought  which 
alone  constitutes  public  opinion  in  this  country,  and  which 
makes  of  government  by  the  people  a  government  strong 
enough,  in  the  language,  of  the  address,  to  ' '  withstand  the 
enterprises  of  faction,  to  confine  each  member  of  the  society 
within  the  limits  prescribed  by  the  laws,  and  to  maintain 
all  in  the  secure  and  tranquil  enjoyment  of  the  rights  of 
person  and  property,"  without  which  "liberty  is  little  else 
than  a  name. ' ' 

Undoubtedly  to  this  people,  who  from  four  have  become 
seventy  millions  in  the  passage  of  their  first  century,  to  reach 
by  the  close  of  the  second,  perhaps,  seven  hundred  millions, 
with  resources  which  can  feed  and  clothe  and  render  happy 
more  than  twice  that  number,  the  solution  of  grave  problems 
is  committed. 

How  shall  the  evils  of  municipal  government,  the  poverty, 
the  vice,  engendered  by  the  disproportionate  growth  of 
urban  populations,  be  dealt  with  as  that  growth  continues? 
How  shall  immigration  be  regulated  so  that  precious  insti- 
tutions may  not  be  threatened  by  too  large  an  influx  of  those 
lacking  in  assimilative  power  and  inclination?  How  shall 
the  full  measure  of  duty  towards  that  other  race,  to  which 
in  God's  providence  this  country  has  been  so  long  a  home, 
be  discharged  so  that  participation  in  common  blessings  and 
in  the  exercise  of  common  rights  may  lead  to  and  rest  upon 
equal  education  and  intelligence?  How  shall  monopoly  be 
checked,  and  the  pressure  of  accumulation  yield  to  that 
equitable  distribution,  which  shall  "undo  excess,  and  each 
man  have  enough?"  How  shall  the  individual  be  held  to 
the  recognition  of  his  responsibility  for  government,  and  to 
meet  the  demand  of  public  obligations?  How  shall  corrup- 
tion in  private  and  public  life  be  eradicated? 

These  and  like  questions  must  be  answered,  and  they  will 


Address  of  Chief  Justice  Fuller.  39 

be  by  the  nation  of  Washington,  which  in  the  exercise  of 
the  sagacity  and  prudence  and  self-control  born  of  free  in- 
stitutions, and  the  cultivation  of  the  humanities  of  Christian 
civilization  will  hallow  the  name  American  by  making  it 
the  synonym  of  the  highest  sense  of  duty,  the  highest  mo- 
rality, the  highest  patriotism,  and  so  become  more  power- 
ful and  more  noble  than  the  powerful  and  noble  Roman 
nation,  which  stood  for  centuries  the  embodiment  of  law 
and  order  and  government,  but  fell  when  the  gods  of  the 
fireside  fled  from  hearthstones  whose  sanctity  had  been  in- 
vaded, and  its  citizens  lost  the  sense  of  duty  in  indulgence 
in  pleasure. 

And  so  the  new  century  may  be  entered  upon  in  the  spirit 
of  optimism,  the  natural  result,  perhaps,  of  a  self-confidence 
which  has  lost  nothing  in  substance  by  experience,  though 
it  has  gained  in  the  moderation  of  its  impetuosity;  yet  an 
optimism  essential  to  the  accomplishment  of  great  ends,  not 
blind  to  perils,  but  bold  in  the  fearlessness  of  a  faith  whose 
very  consciousness  of  the  limitations  of  the  present  asserts 
the  attainability  of  the  untraveled  world  of  a  still  grander 
future. 

No  ship  can  sail  forever  over  summer  seas.  The  storms 
that  it  has  weathered  test  and  demonstrate  its  ability  to  "sur- 
vive the  storms  to  come,  but  storms  there  must  be  until 
there  shall  be  no  more  sea. 

But  as  amid  the  tempests  in  which  our  ship  of  state  was 
launched,  and  in  the  times  succeeding,  so  in  the  times  to 
come,  with  every  exigency  constellations  of  illustrious  men 
will  rise  upon  the  angry  skies,  to  control  the  whirlwind  and 
dispel  the  clouds  by  their  potent  influences,  while  from  the 
' '  clear  upper  sky ' '  the  steady  light  of  the  great  planet  marks 
out  the  course  the  vessel  must  pursue,  and  sits  shining  on  the 
sails  as  it  comes  grandly  into  the  haven  where  it  would  be. 


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